2015 – SGA ARCHIVES

SGA Meeting November 15th, 2015 PART ONE

The following is PART ONE of a summary of the SGA meeting, held at the campus center on Sunday, November 15, 2015.

At 7:10PM, Charlie Bruce called the meeting to order. After roll call, meeting proceeded to announcements, which are as follows:

Emergency Elections are ongoing right now! Nominations for COPS head and Election head end at 9AM November 16^th. Candidates forum is at the campus center from 6-7 on November 19^th. Voting starts next week, and lasts from the 23^rd to the 24^th of November. Email elections@brynmawr.edu to nominate someone or if you have any questions!

The November appointments round is here! Please go to the appointments blog, appointments.blogs.brynmawr.edu for committee descriptions, and for general information about the appointments process. Email gbsmith@brynmawr.edu with questions!

SPECTRA is hosting a movie screening of “You Can Play” in honor of LGBT+ month. They are promoting the inclusion of all athletes in sporting events regardless of sexual orientation. The event will be held in the Campus Center from 7 to 8:30PM. Confirmed – K-Cass will be there, and there will be snacks!

In other sporting news… Basketball plays Nazareth at 1PM on Saturday.

Swimming competes against Washington College on Saturday at 1pm. Swimming has also been raising money, through “Owls Fight For a Cure”, throughout the semester for breast cancer research. All proceeds are donated to Bryn Mawr Hospital. They raised about 500 dollars in the fall season. Thank you so much to everyone who has donated so far. Swimming is hosting an upcoming “Relay for a Cure” – to which KCass will be coming. It will be held on December 2^nd.

The Fall Student Dance concert is this Saturday, November 21^st at 8PM in Marshall Auditorium! There will be free food! Contact jschan@brynmawr.edu and ksegal@brynmawr.edu with questions or concerns.

The Information and Stewardship council wants to make sure that everyone knows about “Securing the Human” on moodle. You should have been getting emails about learning how to stay secure online. Please take a look at the program and encourage everyone else to do that as well. Contact esaladin@brynmawr.edu for more information, or if you have any questions.

There will be a “Coming Out of the Closet” fashion show, hosted by Zami, at Thomas great hall from 7-9pm on November 19^th. Contact mcarrera@brynmawr.edu for more information, or if you would like to model.

Sociology is currently conducting a faculty search, and as such, will be hosting three guest lectures at Bryn Mawr. The First one was Monday, November 16^th, in Dalton 300 at 4:30. The next two are coming up on Thursday 11/19 in Dalton 119 at 4:15. And the third is on Monday 11/23 in Dalton 119 at 4:15. The sociology department highly values student input and encourages anyone who is interested to go. Email the sociology major rep., Miranda Smith, at msmith13@brynmawr.edu for more information.

Next, we moved on to “Your Two Cents”:

Coco Wang and Chanel Williams, the Class of ’16 co-presidents, took a straw poll on a potential change to the name “Garden Party Girls”. A quick background for those who are unfamiliar: Garden Party Girls are underclass people who help seniors organize their table on Erdman Green, the morning of graduation. Coco and Chanel are looking into changing the name because not everyone identifies as female. Their straw poll showed significant interest in changing the name. Email cwilliam02@brynmawr.edu and/or ywong10@brynmawr.edu

Following Coco and Chanel, Charlie Bruce brought up the change in layout. This week, we used a circle set up, but that excluded a lot of people who arrived late and had to sit or stand outside of the circle. Charlie took a “fist of five” opinion of the new layout, which is a work in progress. We have decided to revert to the theatre set up at the next SGA meeting. Email cebruce@brynmawr.edu with suggestions.

Next, we moved on to “Community Guidelines”.

Last week, we talked about how Roberts Rule’s of Order is not very accessible to people who are unfamiliar with it. In other words, the vocabulary is not part of our vernacular, which can make people feel isolated. Thus, we are going to set up community guidelines for participating in conversations. We took suggestions on these new community guidelines, which included the following:

Identifying yourself when you speak, so everyone in the space knows who you are.

Not talking over anyone.

Trust Intent – we all come to the SGA meeting with the assumption that everyone is here with the intention to talk toward resolution. We trust that we come to this space with the intent to be productive.

Use I Statements.

The 48 hour rule – Sometimes, someone will say something to you, but you are emotionally affected. So you take 48 to respond, after you have had time to process it, with more fully formed thoughts. (Is this a good wording?)

Email cebruce@brynmawr.edu with more community guidelines.

The meeting then turned to a discussion of recent events concerning posters that were put up over campus. Which will be detailed in PART TWO of this summary.

SGA Meeting November 8th, 2015

Hello Everyone and welcome back to another SGA recap!

At 7:10 on November 8th, 2015, SGA President Charlie Bruce called the meeting to order. Shortly thereafter, Secretary Angela Motte conducted roll call. We then proceeded to announcements, of which there are several.

First: Emergency Elections! Positions up for election are Election Committee Head and COPS Head. The nomination period started on Sunday, November 8th at 7:56PM and will end on November 16^th, with a duration of approximately one week. Candidates forum will be on November 19^th from 6-7pm. Elections themselves will take place in the days right before thanksgiving! Email elections@brynmawr.edu to nominate someone you know for these positions!

Second: The November appointments round is almost over! Wednesday the 11^th at midnight is the last day to submit your applications! Positions up for reappointment: The McBride representative to the Financial Aid Advisory Board, positions on the Dining Services Advisory Board, the Alcohol Concerns Review Board, and the Customs Committee, as well as the head of the Customs Committee. We are also looking for members of the class of 2017 and 2016 for appointment to the Traditions Committee.

Note: You can hold both an elected position and an appointed position simultaneously.

Visit appointments.blogs.brynmawr.edu for more information and access to the application. Contact gbsmith@brynmawr.edu if you have any questions!

Following announcements, Shakari Badgett conducted a straw poll that gained a visual majority on the question ‘Would you guys want to host a panel with campus safety to ask questions about recent events or to ask them questions about their jobs’.

Next, Seven Sisters Representatives Elizabeth Vandenberg and Emily Spiegel gave a recap of the recent seven sisters conference and told us how we are going to improve our relationship with the other colleges.

The seven sisters conference is an annual meeting of representatives from the seven sister schools. This year it was at Barnard, and included workshops on leadership, inclusion, and diversity. Attendees of the conference had the opportunity to hear alumnae, including Bryn Mawr’s own Peaches Valdes, speak. The purpose of the conference is to help the schools’ student government organizations keep in touch, and to update each other so that we may all improve our organizations.

The conference itself has been around since 2009, and the location of it rotates alphabetically, every year, through Barnard to Wellesley. The document that established the conference is the Constitution of the Coordinating Board for the Seven Sisters Coalition. But the coordinating board itself hasn’t existed for a long time, so at this conference, representatives deciding to reform the coordinating board, start pooling our resources, and start moving toward becoming a more coordinated body. Representatives elected a president pro-tempore.

Next year, the conference will be hosted at Bryn Mawr! Elizabeth Vandenberg ‘16 and Emily Spiegel ‘18 will be planning the conference, and are creating a temporary committee for this purpose.

There will be three representative council votes next week in response to the seven sisters conference. In the first, we will be voting to re-affirm the constitution of the seven sisters. The second will to elect or re-elect representatives to the seven sisters coordinating board. The third will be to establish a temporary committee for the planning of the next seven sister’s conference, at Bryn Mawr. Note, any undergraduate student is eligible to be on the planning committee.

If you are on the representative council, it is suggested that you consult with your constituents on these issues. Contact seven sisters representatives Elizabeth Vandenberg, Emily Spiegel, or the SGA EBoard (sga@brynmawr.edu) with any questions or concerns.

In other news, President Charlie Bruce had an announcement from the President of Barnard’s student government organization. This year, at Barnard, there will be no winter break housing for students who are not athletes or tour guides. This leaves a significant number of people without anywhere to go over winter break. Barnard’s president asks Bryn Mawr alumnae and students who are in the greater New York area to open our homes and our hearts to those without anywhere to go. In the coming weeks, Barnard’s SGA will be discussing this issue, so stay tuned for more information.

In old business, at last week’s SGA meeting we brainstormed ways the college could increase revenue and decrease spending. Our suggestions have been typed up and sent to Kari Fazio, the Chief Financial Officer, and she would like to extend her thanks to members of the representative council! If you have any additional comments or suggestions, please contact her at kfazio@brynmawr.edu

In other old business, President Charlie Bruce is looking in to making the SGA Executive Board a paid position for those with work study. Bear in mind that the E-board at both Haverford and Vassar is a paid position for those with work study. We are looking into this because a position on the E-Board often requires hours equivalent to a part-time job, making positions less accessible to those on work-study. We believe that the SGA and the E-Board should be all inclusive. Email cebruce@brynmawr.edu with questions, comments, or concerns.

At this SGA meeting, we launched Bring-A-Friend-To-SGA-Day! It was a great success – many people came who do not usually attend SGA meetings. This year, the SGA is trying to become more focused on outreach and inclusivity – in the spirit of which, this event was held. Headed by the Members-at-large, attendees broke into five groups and talked about what the SGA can do to increase attendance, and to make SGA meetings feel like an inclusive space where anyone can raise a point.

From these breakout groups with members of the community, we learned that people usually don’t come to meetings because of the time they are held, and because they seem intimidating.

SGA meetings are held at 7pm on Sundays, in the campus center, which is a prime homework time, and also makes it hard for people who live off campus to be there.

Some students are intimidating by the setting and the arrangement of chairs, which makes it hard for people in the back to hear or make statements. Some didn’t know who was on the representative council. Some just felt unwelcome in general. Some things people thought would be helpful include: a list of commonly used SGA terms on the projected slide, as well as a short description of each section of the meets, and more outreach directed toward people who do not regularly attend meetings.

When we returned from bring-a-friend-to-sga-day break out groups, three more items were brought up in new business.

First, the people who give out the keys to the SGA kitchen will have a little card with a checklist of things you should do to keep it nice, if you are using it. Like putting everything away, cleaning up after yourself, or turning off the lights.

Also, if you attend an SGA meeting, please try to keep your use of electronic device at a minimum, unless you are using it for the meeting.

Lastly, next week we will discuss the language used at SGA. Roberts Rule’s of Order are not made up of the most accessible language. While at the seven sister’s conference, we learned that Mount Holyoke had everyone come together and write out a set of community guidelines to change the tone of conversations. Bryn Mawr’s SGA would like to do the same, so the representative council was asked to think about it and come to the next meeting with ideas. These guidelines would be announced at every meeting.

Following that announcement, the SGA meeting was adjourned at 7:55PM, Sunday, November 8th.

SGA Meeting November 1st, 2015

This Sunday, November 1^st, president Charlie Bruce ’16 called the meeting to order at 4:13 PM, in the campus center. The meeting was held earlier than the usual 7PM due to a schedule conflict with Lantern Night. Congratulations to the first years, McBrides, and new transfers!

Several Announcements were made following roll call.

First, the Erdman party has been moved to December 4^th. There will be boxes in every common room for a tampon and pad drive for the homeless – please do not move these boxes!

Second, Sam Heyrick would like to thank the over 500 people who made it to the social committee (SoCo) Halloween party!

Lastly, the November appointments round are upon us again! Positions up for reappointment: Traditions Committee (Class of ’17 and ’16), Financial Aid Advisory Board (McBride Representative), Dining Services Advisory Board, Alcohol Concerns Review Board, Customs Committee Heads, Customs Committee. Please visit appointments@brynmawr.edu for more information about the appointments process and for position descriptions. Email gbsmith@bmc if you have any questions.

Following announcements, the remainder of the SGA meeting was devoted to ruminations on the budget. Vice President Gabrielle Smith and Treasurer Linh Tran attended a budget committee meeting with Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Kari Fazio, who asked the representative council to brainstorm ideas pertaining to where the college could reduce costs and increase revenue. In short – what do students like and want to keep, and what services are not really being used.

In preface to the brainstorming session, the council looked at an expenditure breakdown and a revenue breakdown of the college’s budget. Several key points to note from that are that student tuition only covers 47% of the total revenue needed to fund the college each year. Gifts and endowment income make up most of the rest – 37%. The college’s biggest expenditures are on instruction (37%), institutional support (17%), academic support (14%) and student services (11%). In recent years, the college has made a small amount of surplus, but not enough to be significant.

Given that student tuition only makes up 47% of yearly revenue in the college’s operating budget, there comes a day, called “Give a Hoot Day” when the college ceases to operate using student funds, and instead entirely relies things like Alumnae support and endowment income.

So! Bearing all that in mind, the representative council floated around the following ideas, trying to conceptualize what CFO Kari Fazio described as “the college of the future”:

We could have less, more sustainable landscaping, a re-evaluation of dinning services for more efficient food production and cooking, better insulation in the buildings, an updated heating system, and an increased reliance on college produced solar power.

In this discussion, we also learned that The Lusty Cup and Uncommon Grounds actually loose money, but are kept open because students like them.

On a similar note, it was proposed that in addition to 24 Canaday, the college introduce 24 hour Collier and Carpenter, for majors whose field is not housed in Canaday.

On the fundraising front, it was clarified that alumnae fundraising is actually quite successful –“Direct expenses for fundraising were $4,207,000 in 2015 and $4,195,000 in 2014.” Which yielded about $8,000,000 in donations. Remember, however, that this is only one source of income for the college.

If you have any ideas regarding how to increase revenue, and decrease spending, please email sga@brynmawr.edu

Following this discussion, the SGA meeting was adjourned at 4:54 PM.

Big Cheese 2015 Summary

On Sunday, October 25^th, members of the Bryn Mawr student body had the opportunity to talk with different administrators in three rounds of facilitated group discussions. Following that, representatives summarized each group’s discussion for the rest of the students there.

Bernie Chung-Templeton was invited to talk about dinning and onecard services. The group discussed professional development for student employees – for instance how working in a dining hall can relate to future employment. Additionally, to clarify the take-out policy, you cannot go back to the dinning hall once you have received take-out. You may, however, speak to a manager about extraneous circumstances. Dining hall hours were also discussed, and it seems like dining services is open to the idea of extending hours for breakfast and dinner. Finally, they spoke about using one cards at places other than the dining halls, to be applicable to everyone on the residential meal plan.

Dean Balthazar spoke on the Alcohol Concerns Review Board, which she re-instated this year to address a rise in alcohol related incidents. The purpose of the board is to involve students in the process of addressing alcohol related problems, as well as to answer questions like what to do about small wet-parties. Answering these questions would be helpful to DLT members, who could then spread the message to students in the dorms. The board will also be revising who is on the board, and revisiting the party policy.

Contact sheyrich@bmc to get involved in the Alcohol Concerns Review Board, or if you have any questions.

Both the Director of Financial Aid, Ethel Desmarais, and Pelema Morrice, the Chief Enrollment Officer, were invited to the forum. They stipulated that the best way to talk to financial aid is to go talk in for a face to face meeting, because every situation is unique. They also want to improve communication about financial aid to 1^st generation college students or those who are new to the process – there are initiatives in place to do this as part of the restructuring of the financial aid office. In order to raise awareness about the resources available in the office, they are working on utilizing dorm resources such as peer mentors and DLT. They are also looking at improving access to information on Bryn Mawr’s website. If you have suggestions for how the website can be improved or what information you would like to see on there, contact finaid@brynmawr.edu. They also clarified how outside scholarships affect financial aid from Bryn Mawr. Basically, Bryn Mawr won’t touch the first 500 of anything you get. However, outside scholarships decrease a student’s demonstrated need, which allows the college to allocate those financial resources to another student. In relation to the increasing applicant pool in need of financial aid, instead of rejecting students who need more aid, Kim Cassidy will go out and raise more money to create the resources needed.

Vanessa Cristman was here to discuss the Enid Cook Center and Black at Bryn Mawr. Many people were curious how Black at Bryn Mawr will continue – which it will through its tour and digital archive. The ECC continues to be a safe space for students who choose to live there. Some alums may see the ECC as segregation and Bryn Mawr wants to communicate that it is not, as well as find ways in which the community can talk about this issue further. They also discussed why students who don’t live at the ECC enter it to use the library or kitchen. Ask whether you are using those facilities for the resources, or do you actually want to interact with the community.

Tom King talked about Campus safety: Radnor Halloween will have a police presence on site, most likely a woman, whose main purpose is to ensure the safety of students. Should anything happen, someone will be able to get to the site very quickly, again stressing that it is for the safety of the people at the party. As such, do not be afraid of getting a citation – if something happens, call campus safety.

There will be salt and sand buckets that students can use in the winter, near buildings, to spread over icy patches of the sidewalks. Furthermore, from now on both Haverford and Bryn Mawr are stressing the safety of students as a whole rather than allowing professors to make attending class optional. In inclement weather, the only building that will be kept open are the student run buildings like the libraries. Additionally, the towers are not open to the public due to safety concerns. Tom King also discussed Campus Saftey’s relationship with the FBI, in relation to the recent threat on Bryn Mawr College. Be aware that social media tends to hype up threats that aren’t credible.

Peaches Valdes spoke about the admissions process. Namely, what parts have worked really well. They agreed that a lot of people liked the authenticity of the travel scholar’s program, because it lets prospective students really experience student life at Bryn Mawr. The Mosaic program was also a success.

In regards to the transgender admissions policy, the admissions office will not be specifically sending anything out. However, it is being brought up with prospective students face to face when they come for interviews or tours. Additionally, many news publications about the transgender admissions policies mention Bryn Mawr, which helps get the word out.

They discussed the great responses the admissions office has been getting from the new essay question about the SGA and Honor Code, which is in it’s second year.

The group also talked about how to make interviews less nerve racking, and making sure prospective students know what to do when they are applying. Alumnae are really important to the admissions process, like when the hold interviews.

The admissions office is launching a new video series about the BI-CO and TRI-CO on Bryn Mawr’s website. There will also be videos about traditions, straight from Bryn Mawr students, because that has been a confusing subject to prospective students. A professional videographer will produce both of these video series.

Stephanie Nixon spoke about title nine and sexual assault.

If a sexual assault happens off campus, Bryn Mawr students are still able to utilize the college’s sexual assault resources. Additionally, Stephanie Nixon is trying to create more options for people who don’t want to go through the hearing process regarding sexual assault. Furthermore, a survivor’s closed group is being developed. The group is meant to serve as a private, safe space for those who have survived sexual assault. It hopes to end sexual violence.

They also discussed how to raise awareness for what Title 9 actually is, because many students struggle to explain it.